Defence Cooperation Program

The relationship is largely supported through reciprocal training under the Defence Cooperation Program (DCP) between Vietnam and Australia. This program sees service personnel training in both countries. This takes the form of long-term professional development courses and short courses for Vietnamese personnel at Defence institutions in Australia, Mobile Training Team visits to Hanoi and Laos and individual training in Australia.

Defence relations between the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV) and Australia were formalized in February 1999, when an Australian Defence Attaché was posted to Hanoi.

• Prior to this, there had been minimal Defence interaction, comprising visits by Joint Services Staff College ('96, '98) and preliminary discussions on cooperative Anti-Malarial Research.
• A Colonel of the Vietnam People's Army (VPA) became the first Vietnamese military officer trained in Australia under the Defence Program when he commenced Australian Defence College in January 1999.
• Government policy has consistently been that bilateral Defence relations will proceed "at a pace comfortable to both sides"

The Australia-Vietnam Defence relationship has developed significantly since the Memorandum of Understanding for Defence Cooperation was signed by our Defence Ministers in November 2010. Australia has, for the first time, begun to engage the VPA in practical activities, such as limited training activities between our Navies and Special Forces personnel. At Vietnam’s request, Australia has also taken a lead role in providing English Language and specialist training to VPA peacekeepers prior to their planned inaugural UN peacekeeping deployment to South Sudan in 2014.